{"id":587091,"date":"2026-09-01T17:20:14","date_gmt":"2026-09-01T17:20:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/587091\/"},"modified":"2026-09-01T17:20:14","modified_gmt":"2026-09-01T17:20:14","slug":"benjamin-hale-inquest-tears-as-footage-of-mans-last-moments-alive-played-to-inquest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/587091\/","title":{"rendered":"Benjamin Hale inquest: Tears as footage of man\u2019s last moments alive played to inquest"},"content":{"rendered":"

During a search<\/a>, police were warned to be wary of retrieving Hale due to the possibility he could pull them into the water.<\/p>\n

Officers were also told he had recently been in possession of a firearm.<\/p>\n

During the second day of the inquest, before Coroner Ian Telford, communications centre audio and Eagle helicopter footage were played to the inquest.<\/p>\n

It revealed numerous officers converged on the banks of the Waikato River and its surrounds.<\/p>\n

A dog team began searching an area about 50m north of the bridge and a police boat was launched, carrying three officers and a firefighter with a heat detection device.<\/p>\n

At one point, an officer announces \u201crecent bully\u201d, or intel, over the radio that Hale \u201cmay have been in possession of a pistol in March\u201d.<\/p>\n

Soon afterwards, an officer tells boat personnel to be careful if apprehending Hale as he \u201cposes a great risk\u201d and might try to pull them into the river.<\/p>\n

After the search had been in progress for about an hour, the Eagle helicopter spotted Hale in the river directly opposite the intersection of Cobham Drive and Normandy Ave.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we might have him on the edge of the water, north of the Cobham bridge … down below the skate bowl,\u201d an Eagle crew member announces.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s moving away from you,\u201d he tells officers.<\/p>\n

After about 10 minutes, an officer on the ground says, \u201che\u2019s going under\u201d.<\/p>\n

Another asks, \u201cDo you have him?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s gone under,\u201d the officer states.<\/p>\n

Several of Hale\u2019s wh\u0101nau are attending the inquest, either in person or via audio-visual link, and a few wiped away tears as details of his last moments were revealed.<\/p>\n

\u2018He looked visibly tired\u2019<\/p>\n

The skipper of the boat, Officer C, said after being alerted by the Eagle to Hale in the water, he turned the boat around, with Hale about 100m behind them.<\/p>\n

As he drove up the river, he noticed branches moving, before seeing a man holding on to a tree branch on the western side of the river.<\/p>\n

They found Hale in a narrow part of the river that was renowned for being dangerous because the current was stronger.<\/p>\n

He said he had to \u201cfight to keep the boat in a stable position\u201d and avoid hitting branches or trees while piloting the boat in the dark.<\/p>\n

He noticed Hale.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe looked visibly tired.\u201d<\/p>\n

He saw a couple of officers directly above him, but they couldn\u2019t reach Hale because they were on a clifftop.<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember hearing [officer] telling Hale he was under arrest.<\/p>\n

\"BenjaminBenjamin Hale.<\/p>\n

\u201cI yelled out to Hale and told him to stay where he was.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t hear him say anything back.\u201d<\/p>\n

He wanted him to stay there as he felt he was \u201cfairly safe as he was holding a branch\u201d.<\/p>\n

By then, they were about 20m away, and he and his colleagues on the boat began talking about what to do next.<\/p>\n

Asked by Susan Hughes KC, counsel to the officers, whether that was a feasible distance to throw a flotation device, he said no.<\/p>\n

At that point, he was still battling to control the boat and the current.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith the lack of lighting, I could barely see.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only light was a little spotlight being held, and that just remained on Hale.\u201d<\/p>\n

The officer said he was holding the boat steady and about 20m away from Hale when he saw him let go of the branch, \u201cwithout any comms to or from him\u201d.<\/p>\n

Hale appeared to be swimming upstream, towards the eastern side of the river, and away from the boat.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have seen him take three or four strokes towards the middle of the river.<\/p>\n

\u201cI engaged the motor so that I was slowly moving towards him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have seen him go under the water and pop back up.\u201d<\/p>\n

He edged the boat closer to Hale as \u201cit was obvious he was in strife because of the free-flowing current\u201d.<\/p>\n

It took a few seconds to get within 5 or 10m, when he saw Hale go under the water again.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe didn\u2019t come back up.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I saw him the second time, he wasn\u2019t close enough for a flotation device.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked by Hughes how far away he was, the officer replied, \u201cabout 5m\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we threw the flotation device it wouldn\u2019t have reached him.\u201d<\/p>\n

He manoeuvred the boat slightly north to see if Hale popped up, but he never did.<\/p>\n

They continued searching for about 45 minutes, by which time they were too low on fuel and went back to shore.<\/p>\n

The inquest continues.<\/p>\n

Belinda Feek is an Open Justice reporter based in Waikato. She has worked at NZME for 11 years and has been a journalist for 22.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"During a search, police were warned to be wary of retrieving Hale due to the possibility he could…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":587092,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[5831,806,48469,19473,289067,42,13999,685,16122,9062,43,1118,61492,73172,61,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-587091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-alive","tag-as","tag-benjamin","tag-footage","tag-hale","tag-headlines","tag-inquest","tag-last","tag-mans","tag-moments","tag-news","tag-of","tag-played","tag-tears","tag-to","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=587091"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587091\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/587092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=587091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=587091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=587091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}